COELACANTH CONTROVERSIES

The mingled destinies
of coelacanths and men have not brought out the best in the latter.
Ambition, jealousy, and opportunistic moralizing have plagued
the coelacanth since its 1938 "discovery." First, there
was an uneasy tension between JLB Smith and Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer
who had spotted the fish on the trawler Nerine in December 1938,
and sent Smith the sketch that led to its identification. Courtenay-Latimer
had been unable to preserve the internal organs in the summer
heat and without these Smith had been hard put to prove the fish's
ancient identity to everyone's satisfaction. Smith and Courtenay-Latimer
gave slightly different accounts of their first meeting on his
arrival in East London to see the specimen, his implied that she
was somewhat indifferent to the discovery.

Following the
find of the "second" coelacanth in the Comoros in 1952,
relations between Eric Hunt and Smith deteriorated when jealous
French officials, who felt the coelacanth had been stolen by Smith
from beneath their noses, threatened to revoke Hunt's trading
privileges. Then JLB Smith and the French scientists, who took
over coelacanth research from him by fiat, went at each other
in the late 50's. Smith believing, perhaps erroneously, that coelacanths
were being intentionally caught for the scientists accused them
of an unnecessary "slaughter" of coelacanths which he
held were already endangered. The only justification for catching
a coelacanth, Smith believed, was for exhibiting one in an aquarium.
Articles on the controversy spilled out of scientific journals
onto the pages of the international press.

A new twist to
the same issue erupted in the 1980's when the Explorers Club/
New York Aquarium expeditions visited the Comoros to capture a
coelacanth for aquarium display/research. The Max-Planck submersible
group arrived at the same time and took the further (than Smith)
position that no coelacanth should be even captured
for an aquarium as this would place undue pressure on the small,
dwindling, population. The E.C./New York Aquarium held that learning
techniques of captive husbandry were essential at this time precisely
because of the dwindling population. This controversy also spilled
into the press. New York Aquarium backed off the quest, but Toba
Aquarium of Japan conducted an unsuccessful capture expedition
in 1989 until its funding was cut off. Hans Fricke of the Max-Planck-Institute,
diving with his submersible at the same time the Japanese were
there, placed a sign in one of their traps saying "Coelacanths - Let
them where they are!"

Being "pro coelacanth" is a fairly obvious and
easy position to take in an age of growing conservation awareness.
But moralizing about the fish appears to have had strong opportunistic
elements. Smith, having got what he wanted out of the fish, had no reason
to support the work of the French scientists who were denying him access
and thus accused them of "slaughtering" what were probably
accidental catches. Even as the Max-Planck group criticized the
New York Aquarium in 1988, unsubstantiated stories circulated
that it too had originally planned to capture a coelacanth until
funding for that part of the venture fell through. The Max-Planck
group joined with a group from the JLB Smith Institute of Ichthyology
(see "Expeditions") to form the Coelacanth Conservation
Council or C.C.C. which opposed capture and helped scuttle the
Toba and New York Aquarium projects. Then, reportedly, two of
the C.C.C. directors, not from Max-Planck, hatched a coelacanth
capture plan, later scuttled for the original reasons. And so
it goes.

If the past was any indication, the discovery of coelacanths
in Indonesia was likely to fuel further controversies. And
so it did: a group of different scientists "scooped" the discoverer,
Mark Erdmann and his Indonesian associates in first publishing
a paper naming the find as a new species - Latimeria menadoensis.
Erdmann's group was blindsided. The same group of scientists, trying to justify their previous action, then submitted an article to Nature, claiming prior discovery of the Indonesian coelacanths. While there had been contemporaneous reports of the earlier find, the scientists included a photograph of "their" fish which was an obvious fake: a Photoshop makeover of Mark Erdman's own well known coelacanth picture! Shades of the famous Piltdown Man hoax. In fairness to the scientists, it was not clear which if any of them knew their picture was a fraud. None accepted responsibility.

Then, the discovery of the "new" South African coelacanths shed fresh blood. First two different submersible missions vied for research "rights," with a submersible already visiting South Africa denied access in favor of the Max Planke Institute's "Jago's" planned visit in April, 2002. Next, when the South African "discovery team" returned for dives in May, 2001, South African Park and labor authorities interferred with the dives for several days by revoking permission based on contract technicalities. Rumors circulated that professional jealousies from abroad and within the JLB Smith Institute itself were behind the interference. But the fact that the discovery team (whose third dives were financed by UK CH4) and their associates were commercially exploiting the coelacanth with an internet pay per view scheme might not have helped. At a September, 2001, South African Coelacanth Conservation protocol meeting in Grahamstown, further efforts were made to exclude the discovery team from additional dives. With the renamed JLB Smith Inst (SAIAB) now operating the South African Coelacanth program in conjunction with the parks, free diving to view coelacanths remains highly restricted even for the original discoverers. Nothing new in the world of our favorite fish.

As the 2000's wore on, writers and filmmakers continued to ripoff each other's trade marks, passages, and film footage. The capture contoversy died down with the discovery of new populations, and new groups of Japanese entered the fray pilfering data fom prior researchers- while everyone "holier than thou." Seeing a commercial opportunity with the routinely observed Sodwana coelacanths, National Geographic produced a faux 'discovery' documentary. Meanwhile, at its somewheres beneath the waves, the original heart beats on, the fins wave rythmically, and the gentle flux of the gills give proof of life. -JH